China 2009

London to Beijing @ Beijing, China

2009-07-29T08:55:50.000Z

Arriving after a two leg journey we arrived at the hotel - fatigue overruled excitement and I was fit only for a snooze. After a few hours we felt ready to venture out and headed off into Beijing. The first thing you notice is the weather - a combination of the pollution and very high humidity means that it is very hazy and does not look like a summer's day, however it feels like a sauna. The second thing I noticed is how conspicuous we are here. There don't seem to be many Westerners here at all and boy do we stand out. We have amassed fans all over Beijing who want to know where we come from and have their photo taken with us.

Everyone wants to say hello - some want us to buy stuff, some simply want to talk to us, we feel very welcome.

First stop was Tian'anmen Square of course. This is awesome. The sheer size of it is immense - it takes us about half an hour to walk the length of it - even allowing for photo stops that's big.

At one end is the mausoleum to Mao Zedong - although we did not go in to pay our respects we could see that the people really revere their historical hero.

We decided to save the Forbidden City until tomorrow and explored some more of the modern city. We discovered Qianmen Dajie a shopping street which was in process of being modernised - looks like a modern take on how you would expect a China Town area to appear.

There's somethiing surreal about the bustling metropolis full of cars and buses hurtling along punctuated by pedicabs (are you not supposed to call them rickshaws any more?)

I wa a bit scared by the traffic but you soon realise that as long as no one stops completely everything seems to be fine.

Beijing - full throttle @ Beijing, China

2009-07-30T08:39:41.000Z

Raring to go to tackle the big city. Today we retraced our steps to Tian'anmen Square and took another turn around here. We then carried on further under the gaze of Mao and entered the Forbidden City. Don't underestimate this if you want to make the most of this you need at least 3-4 hours possible a whole day. It's immense and full of history if you're into it so take your time and savour it.

The complex contains a multitudeof temples and rooms which were used for different purposes by the emperors and empresses. They have very evocative namese which describe their purpose and dedication.

Summer Palace @ Yihe Yuan, China

2009-08-01T08:30:47.000Z

This was a bit of an epic - we have to get right to the other side of the city to get to the Summer Palace. The weather is greyer and steamier than ever, but we have to chance it and see how it goes. We took the tube to

Temple of Heaven @ Tiantan, China

2009-08-02T08:00:00.000Z

The sky is quite clear - clear enough to see a blue sky and sun but Gary is ill. He woke not feeling good and so we had a latish start. I think I'm OK but don't feel like running about too much. We welcome the good photo weather but the downside is that the heat is really up and we both feel a bit drained. The Temple of Heaven is relatively near our hotel so we are going to try to get there again. From our hotel we walked to the nearest tube which was about 15 minutes then get to the Temple park which has a metro stop outside.

The temple enclosure is really beautiful and all the more lovely for the sun shining on it. I was struck once again by the space that there is - huge areas of park land and long, long pathways where families are enjoying the promenade. They stroll along, they fly kites, the fan themselves on the side of the paths and they take hundreds and thousands of photos. Lucky them - my camera pooped out after 3 shots. I think I forgot to charge it last night. You are treated to some of Gs pictures

In the evening when we returned we

Xian @ Tiantan, China

2009-08-04T12:45:42.000Z

The second leg of the journey. Soft sleeper train journey to this city which will be the staging post for our visit ot the terracotta warriors. Tip - if you do this make sure you give yourself plenty of time to get to the Beijing West station in time to queue up to get on the train - it all went very smoothly, there are just a lot of people all doing the same thing.

Stumbled out of the station to be picked by Warren a local - what? lets say entrepreneur! He gave us a lift to our hotel and became our tour guide while we were there.

Warren drove us out of town to see the warriors - even though we had seen the touring exhibition in Paris last year - it still did not prepare us for the scale and magnificence.

Chengdu - furthest west @ Chengdu, China

2009-08-10T12:43:19.000Z

Moving on again and I'm feeling real separation pangs to leave Xian. Warren had arranged a taxi to the airport and we caught our morning flight arriving at lunch time to get a taxi to the hotel. Well what a treat, for such a long trip we have to ration ourselves to a certain extent but the hotel we arrived at was the nicest we have ever stayed in. Your money does go further here and we have got used to lots of frills such as slippers and fluffy towelling robes but hti splace does everything to the nth degree. The robes are fluffier, the slippers plusher and the toiletries more extensive and luxurious. The room itself is to die for and when I do my grand design this is what I'm modelling my bedroom suite on! I apologise to "proper" travellers that we are not roughing it more but we still need our creature comforts. The bell boy who took our bags ups wasted no time in selling us a trip to Emeishan and the giant Buddha, which is why we came here. We aranged a tripfor the next day leaving at 7.00 a.m. (yes me getting up for a 7 am departure) and returning 7pm that evening. I don't know if you can get the impression from the photos but without a doubt this is an incredible sight. Apologies for the overuse of superlatives but I have on several occasions felt awe, wonder and disbelief at what I am seeing! .

Serendipity @ Wulingyuan, China

2009-08-13T19:28:36.000Z

Ever since we spent the day not doing much I'm not aloud to be lazy ob Gary's birthday. So we arose fairly promptly with a plan.

Wuling Yuan @ Wulingyuan, China

2009-08-14T10:44:52.000Z

This is a National Scenic park and reputedly the most beautiful place in China. This is why it is on our itinerary. If you've seen any photos of China's natural heritage - you've probably seen Wulingyuan aka Zhangjiajie. It is a unique landscape of soaring karst rock formations - these are huge pillars of rock that have been weathered away to make this a scene like nowhere else. We have five days here in which we hope to see and capture some of the beauty.

Oh joy, the first good thing has happened - we can see blue sky. While it has been hot at all previous destinations so far we have been lucky to see much of the sky as it has been humid and overcast (pesky sub tropical climate for you!) but here the sky is blue with fluffy clouds floating along perfect for those photos.

Shenzhen, China @ Shenzhen, China

2009-08-20T03:45:26.000Z

Beer Theme Parks Shopping

Stopping here was a compromise - its near Hong Kong and therefore possible to visit from here without paying sky high hotel rates. The flight from Zhangjiajie was already delayed and we had to wait a further hour and a half before we started boarding. Once we landed we came out of the airport which was virtually in darkness and found our selves being ushered into a taxi which was a long walk from the airport entrance in a dark and smelly car park. I was a teensey bit worried but I think the only thing dodgy about our taxi driver was his knowledge. So we did not check into hour hotel until nearly 4 am.

Many people that we have met on this trip have raised their eyebrows when we tell them we are making a stop in Shenzhen. "There is nothing there for tourists" they say. Well I'm pleased to say I wouldn't have missed the first day here for the world.

We visited "Window on the World" a theme park full of scale models of the world's most famous landmarks. I have a love of all things miniature or oversized and this seemed like the perfect place for me.

Well it didn't disappoint; we wandered round and I have to admit I regressed to childhood in about 3 minutes flat. The entrance smacks of Duff World with a huge inflatable stein of beer and all of the pillars sporting giant beer bottles of different brands. We found out they were having a beer fest "Quelle dommage" as you can imagine Gary was really annoyed!

We started playing a game of "We've been there" as we passed Barcelona, London, Paris and Bangkok among others.

Once the light had faded we hit the beer hall and sampled a few good brews, they are mostly lager type offerings and they seem to be keen on German Weissbeer - one of my favourites. So we were treated to Eastern European dancers including the Russian knees up kind, belly dancers and Austrian style dancing followed by Chinese hat jugglers - all fantastic.

Punters seemed to be jostling to sit with us and although we could not converse we had great company for the evening.

Hong Kong No-ey @ Shenzhen, China

2009-08-21T10:31:32.000Z

I spoke to soon yesterday. Our first major cock up has occured, our visa has been set up incorrectly so we cannot go into Hong Kong without getting a new one. That's loads of dosh and time we haven't got. Boo hoo hoo!

As we came out of the border crossing a "passerby" asked if he could help us. John became our tour guide and helped us get to the Damaysha beach resort by escorting us onto a local bus which trundled along for about 50 minutes eastwards up the coast. Here there was quite a simple beach with a few shops selling the usual beach paraphernalia. I spent £4 on a swimming costume as I hadn't brought mine with me. We hired a beach umbrella for a few hours and sat on the beach. The beach was quite busy but John insisted that there were hardly any people there by normal standards. He is an amiable fellow but kept telling us how much the credit crunch was biting into his income.

I'm beginning to understand how famous people must feel about the paparrazi. It's quite nice when people say hello and ask if the can have their photo taken with me - I've become accustomed to assuming the position and I even do the peace sign now- but it's a major pain in the butt when they grab hold of me and/or jam their cameras in my face. Oh the price of fame!

Nice afternnon on the beach. Gresat dinner at this amazing place where htey cook up a killer spicy hot pot at the table. Each table has a cermic hot plate built into it. Can't figure out the name of the place yet I'll have to get it translated.

Birthday @ Shenzhen, China, China

2009-08-22T12:01:37.000Z

Today's my birthday and I was feeling a bit glum as my treat was to be a day in Hong Kong. That's not to be so got over my sulking a we went shopping. We started off by nosing around in the brand new Sheraton Hotel in the downtown area. It's one of those places that I would normally feel the need to dress up before I dared enter. A very helpful floor manager sorted us out with a map of Shenzhen which we had'nt been able to acquire elsewhere. He also managed to usher us out of the hotel without us feeling that we had been turfed out.

After that we spent a leisurely afternoon mooching around the designer stores - no bargains here and was reminiscent of Thailand in that the Chinese make me seem Amazonian in size; but very entertaining.

Downtown Shenzhen emphasises that everything is BIG. The malls, the streets teh skyscrapers are all immense and while we were going wow, I couldn't help thinking of the electricity bills!

We finished the evening with a sumptuous meal in a Thai restaurant in the downtown area.

Shanghai delights @ Shanghai, China

2009-08-24T09:47:47.000Z

If Chinese cities were a family everyone would see Beijing as the prim and proper older sister and Shanghai as the wild child. It's a young city with a history of being cosmopolitan and a bit naughty and it shows.

Everything's really in your face here. There have been people hawking their wares everywhere we have been, but in Shanghai they don't take no for an answer! We were pursued relentlessly by a tiny but ferocious young woman trying to sell us watches; luggage; clothes or anything else she could think of. It was a bit hectic. Switch on ultimate "No" mode. I'm a terminally polite person but in the end I the only solution was to be rude!

The French Conncession is a great area which shows off some of that old style Glamour with some very interesting buildings.

Shanghai is full of places to spend yuour money and we had fun exploring the shops but once again I was reminded that while I'm quite average size in the west in Asia I'm quite the Amazon!. I had to work hard to find clothes to fit and neither Gary or I could get shoes big enough. What a nightmare to be surrounded by shoes and not able to have any of them "Boo Hoo Hoo!"

The neon extravaganza that occurs every evening is quite remarkable and a good way to see it was from the revolving restaurant on the top of the Radisson Hotel. Make sure to save up a special fund for your meal there.

We finished off our time there with a great meal and discovered an excellent dark smioky bar called Yin Yang (how original) which did fab cocktails

Beijing again @ Beijing, China

2009-08-28T09:49:27.000Z

On the morning of the last day of our hoilday we woke up to road noise and shouting - workmen start early here. Breakfast was so so or maybe it was just my mood. After checking out we were standing outside the anonymous airport hotel waiting for the shuttle. The day was beautiful, blue sky and hardly any cloud - we talked about the weather when we arrived in Beijing a month ago.

At the airport it was a case of join the biggest queue for checki in. As we waited, a girl was giving out luggage tags and advised we would be delayed by 4 hours! What would happen about our connecting flight?

While waiting we talked with the guy in front, a Finn who lives in Beijing. He also had a connection in Helsinki that he was likely to miss. "if I had known we should have gone into Beijing to take those photos" I said.

I suggested that we do this as we would have a hell of a wait in the airport if indeed the delay was the length they said.

So after eventually checking our bags in we calculated that we had 4 hours to get into Beijing and back so we sprinted to the airport shuttle terminal and got onto the train just as it was about to leave.

Once in Beijing we headed straight for Tiananmen Square and retraced our footsteps. Not enough time for the Forbidden City or Summer Palace, the two places that would definitely be improved by some sunshine. Nevertehless, we managed to have a great second bite at Beijing. I always find going home depressing but this was a great way to finish an absolutely fabulous adventure

Home @ Brighton, United Kingdom

2009-09-10T19:23:23.000Z

Have been home 2 weeks now and we want to go again. It may be my short attention span but this seems like the best trip ever. Knowing that there are so many places in the world that we still want to see, it's unusual for us to start thinking about the return journey before we've finished unpacking. I called this trip Once in a Lifetime - well maybe not.

Watch this space